BACK
STAGE WEST
October
26, 2000
THE
LION KING
at
the Pantages Theatre
They
say you can't argue with success, but here goes. Disney's Tony-winning stage
adaptation of its hit animated film The Lion King, now onstage in
Hollywood's newly sumptuous Pantages Theatre, is really two shows for the price
of one: The first is a captivating, haunting, endlessly inventive visual and
aural feast, with South African choral-and-drum music by Lebo M, sinuous
choreography by Garth Fagan, almost edibly gorgeous lighting by Donald Holder,
and the ingenious puppetry of Michael Curry. As shaped by director Julie
Taymor, this first show is indeed as groundbreaking and replete with theatrical
wonders as the hype has promised.
The
second show, which shares the stage uncomfortably with the first, is a tacky
rehash of the animated film, complete with Elton John and Tim Rice's
unprepossessing songs, and Roger Allers and Irene Mecchi's flat
characterizations and vapid dialogue; blame for the clunky lyrics to the new
music is spread among five writers. While much of the design ingenuity of the
aforementioned masters is also evident in this other show, its key elements--book,
lyrics, and music--range from mildly diverting to appalling.
What's
worst, though, about the ungainly live-animation portions of The Lion King is that they're infused
with an aggressively insipid tone, immediately recognizable as a sort of
default Disney house style, which crops up in its less inspired kiddie
material, of both the animated and live variety (Fantasyland Theatre, anyone?).
This is undeniably a matter of taste and age--but then, last I checked, The
Lion King
is not a carny attraction but a Broadway musical aimed as much at adult
theatregoers as the Simba set.
There's
a difference between beautiful and cute, and the gulf gapes wide here. One
transition illustrates: After the young lion Simba's father, Mufasa (a stiff
Rufus Bonds Jr.), is trampled to death in a wildebeest stampede (a nice,
stirring stage effect), we get some perfunctory story points over his
motionless corpse, as Mufasa's plotting brother Scar (an assuredly dastardly
John Vickery) lays the guilt on Simba (Adrian Diamond on the night reviewed)
and encourages him to get lost; Simba does so with a minimum of tears or fuss,
and there's some snickering by a trio of unfunny hyenas. It's a cartoonish
postmortem for the late great king of the Pridelands. At last, though, the
stage goes quiet and Mufasa is properly mourned in a gorgeous a cappella trio
by the baboon Rafiki (Fuchsia), the widowed queen (Carla Renata Williams), and
the young lioness Nala (Lisa Tucker on the night reviewed).
That
would make a great first act curtain--at least we might go out feeling
something--but instead we've first got to meet meerkat Timon (Danny Rutigliano)
and warthog Pumbaa (Bob Bouchard), the comic duo who will raise the young Simba
in exile and teach him a life of unambitious subsistence. While Rutigliano and
Bouchard offer a dose of humor and a semblance of character in a show parched
for it, and while their puppet work is admirable and deft, we're back in
toyland here; Timon comes off like a Borscht-Belt Tigger and Pumbaa like Stimpy
with tusks.
It's
hard to begrudge a show so obviously eager to please, so lavishly realized, or
so enthusiastically embraced. But the daisy chain of world-beating, magical
moments in Lion King--the "Circle of Life" opening, a lionesses'
hunting dance, a grassland ballet--just doesn't survive the show's stampede of
pap and tickle. Next time Disney so liberally bankrolls a strong director, it
would be great if there were also a score and a book--a musical, in short--worthy
of her or our time.
"The Lion King," presented by Walt Disney
Theatricals at the Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood. Tues.-Fri.
8 p.m., Sat. 2 & 8 p.m., Sun. 1 & 6:30 p.m. Oct. 19-Oct. 1, 2001.
$12-77. (213) 365-5555.